Recruiting AFL Trade & Free Agency IX

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AFL TRADE, DRAFT AND FREE AGENCY DATES 2021

Grand Final
Saturday September 25


Draft Combine – Vic Country
Friday October 1

Restricted and Unrestricted Free Agency Window
Friday October 1 – Friday October 8


Delisted Free Agency Window 1
Wednesday October 3 - Monday October 15

Trade Period (picks and players)
Monday October 4 (9am) – Wednesday October 13 (7.30pm)


Draft Combines (States and Regions)
VM: Saturday October 9 (tbc)
Qld: Sunday October 10

Tas: Monday October 11
SA: Saturday October 16

WA: Sunday October 17
NSW&ACT: tbc
NT: will join SA or Qld


Trade Period (picks only)
Monday October 18 – Monday November 15

List Lodgement 1
Friday October 29


Delisted Free Agency Window 1
Wednesday November 3 (9am) – Tuesday November 9 (5pm)

List Lodgement 2 (Final date for primary list delistings)
Wednesday November 10 (2pm)


Delisted Free Agency Window 2
Thursday November 11 (9am) – Monday November 15 (5pm)

Draft Nominations Due
Wednesday November 17 (3pm)

Pre-Season Commences (First to fourth year players)
Monday November 22


National Draft
Round 1: Wednesday November 24 (7pm)
Round 2–end: Thursday November 25 (7pm)

Rookie Upgrade Period
Thursday November 25 (10pm) - Thursday November 25 (11pm)


Delisted Free Agency Window 3
Thursday November 25 (10pm) - Thursday November 25 (11pm)

Pre-Selected Rookie Nominations Due (Includes Academy, Father/Son)
Friday November 26 (12pm) - Friday November 26 (12.30pm)


Preseason Draft
Friday November 26 (3pm)


Pre-Selected Rookie Notification
Friday November 26 (3.15pm)

Rookie Draft
Friday November 26 (3.20pm)

Final List Lodgement
Monday November 29 (4pm)


Pre-Season Commences (All other players)
Monday December 6


Pre-Season Supplemental Selection Period (SSP)
December - March (tbc)
Current Contract Status
2021 Draft Watch
Father/Son and NGA
Adrian Dodoro

 
Last edited:
Apr 23, 2016
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Well we weren't committed to Dunstan who is the same age as Jake Kelly. If you were to ask me which I'd prefer, I'd prefer Dunstan/Greenwood for our list over Kelly.

Sure we're not premiership contenders, but why enter the year with shallow depth? There's no harm for a side like us to look at our 2022 prospects while simultaneously keeping an eye out for the future. We're always scraping the barrel come finals because half our list is injured/underdone and then we proceed to get smashed in contested football again. We've made finals 3 out of the last 5 years so our aim should be to improve on that.

I'd say a guy like Greenwood is the perfect recruit for our side. 2 years of solid football to teach our young mids how to play tough contested football. It perfectly aligns with Rutten's vision of building a contested brand and he comes free.

Merrett, Parish, McGrath, Langford, Stringer and Shiel are experienced and in their prime now. We theoretically should be having a premiership standard midfield with that level of experience, but we clearly don't. That group had 4 out of 6 who were injured, with one missing the final and two being underdone. Then we have inexperienced players like Caldwell, Perkins and our first round pick this year who are some time away (Caldwell mainly due to being injury prone). We need to fill that awkward gap with some experience as a stopgap until they are ready to replace him.

We should also never make list decisions based on our full strength side considering we're always one of the worst hit by injuries.
It's perfect if Greenwood can't crack our midfield, but that's almost zero chance of happening.

I was all for Dunstan as an addition FWIW, and think Kelly is a smart addition given we don't really have a defensive stopper for the small - medium types.

I just don't think all the moaning and groaning about Greenwood is warranted because he doesn't actually fit the list demographic we're chasing, nor do we know how realistic it was to pursue him if you weren't David Noble.

As I said; right kind of player, but the wrong age.
 
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We dont have a big young inside mid whos ready yet.

North literally moved Ziebell out, delisted Dumont who can play both inside/out

There midfield group (Include Wings) before delistings was

Cunnington
Ziebell (Played back)
Jed Anderson
L.Davies Uniake
Dumont (Delisted)
Simpkin
T.Thomas
W.Phillips
T.Powell
Dom Tyson (Delisted)
A.Bonar (Played back)

Polec
B.Scott (Wingers/High HFFs)

It a pretty good list of mids

It does seem strange that they had such an oversupply that they needed to move Ziebell and Bonar down back and delisted younger Dumont and Tyson.

Regardless its a great pick just think North wouldve/shouldve been just about the last option
yeah, its a pretty good setup

They've built the middle, just need the bookends...and probably ruck depth.
Is JHF unpassable? I wonder if they've got an ace up the sleeve to sell the access for overs to the Crows and look to build their KP stocks
 
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yeah, its a pretty good setup

They've built the middle, just need the bookends...and probably ruck depth.
Is JHF unpassable? I wonder if they've got an ace up the sleeve to sell the access for overs to the Crows and look to build their KP stocks
Alot of top 10 picks there isnt there

They seem set on JHF and had opportunities already to do that.

They do have CCJ, Larkey, Zurhaar up forward and Corr, Ben Mckay down back, still a pretty young group there. Another tall defender would be handy unless im missing someone

You wouldnt want to get them in a cold wet winter slog fest next year
 

Ants

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Well we weren't committed to Dunstan who is the same age as Jake Kelly. If you were to ask me which I'd prefer, I'd prefer Dunstan/Greenwood for our list over Kelly.

Sure we're not premiership contenders, but why enter the year with shallow depth? There's no harm for a side like us to look at our 2022 prospects while simultaneously keeping an eye out for the future. We're always scraping the barrel come finals because half our list is injured/underdone and then we proceed to get smashed in contested football again. We've made finals 3 out of the last 5 years so our aim should be to improve on that.

I'd say a guy like Greenwood is the perfect recruit for our side. 2 years of solid football to teach our young mids how to play tough contested football. It perfectly aligns with Rutten's vision of building a contested brand and he comes free.

Merrett, Parish, McGrath, Langford, Stringer and Shiel are experienced and in their prime now. We theoretically should be having a premiership standard midfield with that level of experience, but we clearly don't. That group had 4 out of 6 who were injured, with one missing the final and two being underdone. Then we have inexperienced players like Caldwell, Perkins and our first round pick this year who are some time away (Caldwell mainly due to being injury prone). We need to fill that awkward gap with some experience as a stopgap until they are ready to replace him.

We should also never make list decisions based on our full strength side considering we're always one of the worst hit by injuries.
It's perfect if Greenwood can't crack our midfield, but that's almost zero chance of happening.
Our midfield last year got hit hard by injuries. Draper, Shiel, Caldwell, McGrath, Langford. Cox & Perkins ran out of puff with no 2020 games, and Durham dropped off with no 2020 games or preseason. Waterman not yet the engine to go in there.

And yet despite all of that, we generally went fine there, and better as the year ran on. Most of the above should improve, although of course we could have another bad injury run. We’ll probably add another mid with #13. And if desperate, we can add an AA midfielder in Heppell in.

We really don’t need mature, list clogging, midfield depth. While with Gleeson delisted and questions over Cutler, we desperately needed small/medium back depth. Kelly was a great fit.

We also could have really used Rosas or Hill for the forward line.

All Greenwood would do is take AFL time away from a youngster, or play VFL. Much better to get a youngster in instead. Also saves salary cap for more logical FA opportunities.
 

JayJ20

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We had interest in Dunstan but when the reigning premier comes knocking who's saying no?
They came in late though. We expressed our interest far earlier (albeit without commitment) and he even publicly named us as the team he'd like to play for, but we stalled to see what else was happening. Melbourne gave him more assurance so of course he is not going to wait around for us.
 

JayJ20

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I was all for Dunstan as an addition FWIW, and think Kelly is a smart addition given we don't really have a defensive stopper for the small - medium types.

I just don't think all the moaning and groaning about Greenwood is warranted because he doesn't actually fit the list demographic we're chasing, nor do we know how realistic it was to pursue him if you weren't David Noble.

As I said; right kind of player, but the wrong age.
See that's where we differ. His age is not an issue for me because I don't think we need more than 2 years out of him given we're going the draft route. Just a stopgap for a couple of years until our draftees mature. It's not like we'd have been trading for him.

Our midfield last year got hit hard by injuries. Draper, Shiel, Caldwell, McGrath, Langford. Cox & Perkins ran out of puff with no 2020 games, and Durham dropped off with no 2020 games or preseason. Waterman not yet the engine to go in there.

And yet despite all of that, we generally went fine there, and better as the year ran on. Most of the above should improve, although of course we could have another bad injury run. We’ll probably add another mid with #13. And if desperate, we can add an AA midfielder in Heppell in.

We really don’t need mature, list clogging, midfield depth. While with Gleeson delisted and questions over Cutler, we desperately needed small/medium back depth. Kelly was a great fit.

We also could have really used Rosas or Hill for the forward line.

All Greenwood would do is take AFL time away from a youngster, or play VFL. Much better to get a youngster in instead. Also saves salary cap for more logical FA opportunities.
That's my point. Our midfield was hit hard by injuries. We need a little bit more depth to cover the injuries we may have.

Putting aside injuries, I don't think our full strength midfield is anything special. We're average defensively, around stoppages and winning contested ball. Stringer, Parish and Draper make us dominant around centre bounces, but that's as far as it goes.

I don't believe Greenwood would take time away from youngsters because what youngster do we have that's ready to play when injuries eventually come? Not going to be our draftee. Perkins isn't ready and needs to work on applying himself as a forward first. We delisted Clarke. Who else?

I don't know how you can call Greenwood a list clogger. He is one of the best tackling mids in the competition. We don't have anyone other than Parish that is better than him in contested situations.

I can already see what we're going to do. We'll just throw Waterman in there hoping that he can recapture his form as an inside mid from 4+ years ago. Or maybe Smith again. We've never paid any respect to winning contested ball in the 16+ years finals drought so I can see us going that way.
 
Greenwood and Hewett going to rivals for free without so much as an inkling of Essendon interest is as disappointing as it is ‘on brand’ for us.

If you were to ask me who the best possible complimentary pieces were for our midfield they would be the first two on my list.
 

Mikevk123

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Ziebell is simply not a very good player. He seems OK at the moment because he seagulls possessions at half-back whilst being a terrible defender and a bad user of the ball. Every North Melbourne supporter I know groans whenever he gets the ball and all seem to think if he wasn't the Captain he wouldn't even be playing. Bonar wasn't getting it done in the middle. Moving those guys out of the midfield isn't happening because they're so flush with midfielders, it's because they weren't making the grade as midfielders at AFL level.

So it's Cunnington and Anderson, with LDU / Simpkin / Thomas all quality but yet to put together a full season of quality work, then Philips / Powell / Horne-Francis. Greenwood doesn't necessarily fit their list demographic that well either really.

We've got Merrett, Parish & Shiel who are all now proven commodities in the middle, McGrath & Caldwell would be somewhere between the LDU / Simpkin / Thomas and Phillips / Powell group at the moment given they've not shown consistent performances through the middle. Giving a guy who's ~ 30 to start next season 3 years isn't what we need right now; right type of player, wrong demographic for our current list. If Greenwood was 26, then yes we should well and truly have been all over it.

Zieball used to be pretty good when he played through the middle and at half forward. Reckon he would of been better in our system 2017-19
 

Mikevk123

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Greenwood and Hewett going to rivals for free without so much as an inkling of Essendon interest is as disappointing as it is ‘on brand’ for us.

If you were to ask me who the best possible complimentary pieces were for our midfield they would be the first two on my list.

Have a feeling the club is pretty happy with how our midfield is looking. We do lack a big inside mid but the game is slowly going away from them unless they are elite. We also lack depth which I hope we can rectify.

Merrett, Parish, Shiel, McGrath, Langford and Caldwell is a pretty good group. Add in Stringer, Cox, Snelling, Perkins, Durham, Ham and Guelfi who can all play either on the wing or inside.
 
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Alot of top 10 picks there isnt there

They seem set on JHF and had opportunities already to do that.

They do have CCJ, Larkey, Zurhaar up forward and Corr, Ben Mckay down back, still a pretty young group there. Another tall defender would be handy unless im missing someone

You wouldnt want to get them in a cold wet winter slog fest next year
is there any team we'd want to play in that weather?
 
Have a feeling the club is pretty happy with how our midfield is looking. We do lack a big inside mid but the game is slowly going away from them unless they are elite. We also lack depth which I hope we can rectify.

Merrett, Parish, Shiel, McGrath, Langford and Caldwell is a pretty good group. Add in Stringer, Cox, Snelling, Perkins, Durham, Ham and Guelfi who can all play either on the wing or inside.

Club might be fine with it, we’ll just continue to get ground up and spit out like mid priced rump
 

Mikevk123

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Club might be fine with it, we’ll just continue to get ground up and spit out like mid priced rump

At least we seem to be interested in hitting the draft properly this time around. It’s going to take a few years we just need to see some of the younger talls develop. Reckon Perkins will be a midfielder eventually. Once his tank is better.
 
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Have a feeling the club is pretty happy with how our midfield is looking. We do lack a big inside mid but the game is slowly going away from them unless they are elite. We also lack depth which I hope we can rectify.

Merrett, Parish, Shiel, McGrath, Langford and Caldwell is a pretty good group. Add in Stringer, Cox, Snelling, Perkins, Durham, Ham and Guelfi who can all play either on the wing or inside.

Agreed. Who is Hewett pushing out of that midfield. He can't really play elsewhere. If we are going to relegate McGrath to a half back or Stringer permanent forward, it better be a Oliver/Petracca level player forcing them out.
 

fairbump_playon

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See that's where we differ. His age is not an issue for me because I don't think we need more than 2 years out of him given we're going the draft route. Just a stopgap for a couple of years until our draftees mature. It's not like we'd have been trading for him.


That's my point. Our midfield was hit hard by injuries. We need a little bit more depth to cover the injuries we may have.

Putting aside injuries, I don't think our full strength midfield is anything special. We're average defensively, around stoppages and winning contested ball. Stringer, Parish and Draper make us dominant around centre bounces, but that's as far as it goes.

I don't believe Greenwood would take time away from youngsters because what youngster do we have that's ready to play when injuries eventually come? Not going to be our draftee. Perkins isn't ready and needs to work on applying himself as a forward first. We delisted Clarke. Who else?

I don't know how you can call Greenwood a list clogger. He is one of the best tackling mids in the competition. We don't have anyone other than Parish that is better than him in contested situations.

I can already see what we're going to do. We'll just throw Waterman in there hoping that he can recapture his form as an inside mid from 4+ years ago. Or maybe Smith again. We've never paid any respect to winning contested ball in the 16+ years finals drought so I can see us going that way.
I wouldn’t have minded the depth.

There is an often overlooked factor in list age demographic conversations. It’s not just about whether the guy you get in can be useful for a period. I totally agree that Greenwood would have been useful on the 2022/23 list, and the salary doesn’t matter…. but he probably has no future beyond that.

The only thing he does cost is the possible upside on the kid you would have taken in his place. I understand why a side in our position would rather go a bit skinny for depth right now in the hope that they instead pick a kid who develops well and can impact a bit later when we have one leg in the window.
 

JayJ20

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I wouldn’t have minded the depth.

There is an often overlooked factor in list age demographic conversations. It’s not just about whether the guy you get in can be useful for a period. I totally agree that Greenwood would have been useful on the 2022/23 list, and the salary doesn’t matter…. but he probably has no future beyond that.

The only thing he does cost is the possible upside on the kid you would have taken in his place. I understand why a side in our position would rather go a bit skinny for depth right now in the hope that they instead pick a kid who develops well and can impact a bit later when we have one leg in the window.
I don't mind giving up one list spot for depth because it's unlikely the young kid we pick up instead will become an A-grader if he even makes it. The benefits far outweigh the cons and I'll explain why.

Rutten said our aim is to play a contested brand of football after the EF loss given we were smashed in that area.
If we're going to build a contested "blue collar" side, then we'd need to start thinking about who can achieve that. It's better to build the brand of football we want to play now so we have the system in place and then replace ageing players with youngsters capable of playing to our preferred system.
Look at Richmond for example. They prioritised their brand of football first (pressure, punishing turnovers and endurance), made sure they had the players capable of executing that and won 3 premierships. Once they became established, many of their youngsters just walked into their side and won a premiership because the system was defined and effective. Even when Cotchin, Dusty, Prestia, Nankervis etc were out injured, the system held up well because their style of play complemented their list.

Melbourne have been a contested side for years and recruited players to fit that style of play. Of course they're going to win a premiership playing their preferred style.

We say we're going to build a contested brand, but with who? What player other than Parish is capable of consistently winning contested ball in rain, hail or sunshine?

The way I see it, not recruiting players that complement the brand of football we want to play unnecessarily delays what we want to achieve by 1, 2 or even 3 years depending on when the likes of Perkins and new draftee become ready. Why not achieve your goal now and maintain it later?

Anyway this is how I see it and I hope I'm proven wrong, but I don't think it's a good idea to ignore inside depth.
 

fairbump_playon

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I don't mind giving up one list spot for depth because it's unlikely the young kid we pick up instead will become an A-grader if he even makes it. The benefits far outweigh the cons and I'll explain why.

Rutten said our aim is to play a contested brand of football after the EF loss given we were smashed in that area.
If we're going to build a contested "blue collar" side, then we'd need to start thinking about who can achieve that. It's better to build the brand of football we want to play now so we have the system in place and then replace ageing players with youngsters capable of playing to our preferred system.
Look at Richmond for example. They prioritised their brand of football first (pressure, punishing turnovers and endurance), made sure they had the players capable of executing that and won 3 premierships. Once they became established, many of their youngsters just walked into their side and won a premiership because the system was defined and effective. Even when Cotchin, Dusty, Prestia, Nankervis etc were out injured, the system held up well because their style of play complemented their list.

Melbourne have been a contested side for years and recruited players to fit that style of play. Of course they're going to win a premiership playing their preferred style.

We say we're going to build a contested brand, but with who? What player other than Parish is capable of consistently winning contested ball in rain, hail or sunshine?

The way I see it, not recruiting players that complement the brand of football we want to play unnecessarily delays what we want to achieve by 1, 2 or even 3 years depending on when the likes of Perkins and new draftee become ready. Why not achieve your goal now and maintain it later?

Anyway this is how I see it and I hope I'm proven wrong, but I don't think it's a good idea to ignore inside depth.
You’re making sense but it’s line ball whether that “contested brand” would have been swayed much by Greenwood running around in the 2s for half the year. Like… it wouldn’t hurt and might help. But we might also unearth a gun with a third round pick.

List management will be expecting all of Shiel, Caldwell, Stringer & Parish to be winning contested footy week in, week out. Hope they stay healthy!
 

Ants

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That's my point. Our midfield was hit hard by injuries. We need a little bit more depth to cover the injuries we may have.

Putting aside injuries, I don't think our full strength midfield is anything special. We're average defensively, around stoppages and winning contested ball. Stringer, Parish and Draper make us dominant around centre bounces, but that's as far as it goes.
But as you say, the midfield was hit hard by injuries, but still went well enough for us to finish top 8. Simply getting guys back from injury, and more time into Caldwell/Cox/Durham/Perkins and whoever we select this year will bring natural improvement.

I don't believe Greenwood would take time away from youngsters because what youngster do we have that's ready to play when injuries eventually come? Not going to be our draftee. Perkins isn't ready and needs to work on applying himself as a forward first. We delisted Clarke. Who else?

I don't know how you can call Greenwood a list clogger. He is one of the best tackling mids in the competition. We don't have anyone other than Parish that is better than him in contested situations.

I can already see what we're going to do. We'll just throw Waterman in there hoping that he can recapture his form as an inside mid from 4+ years ago. Or maybe Smith again. We've never paid any respect to winning contested ball in the 16+ years finals drought so I can see us going that way.
At the moment if we play 8 midfielders, we've already got 6 of them locked in. Parish, Merrett, McGrath, Shiel, Langford, Caldwell. So that's ignoring Stringer. That leaves 2 spots for development of Cox, Durham, Perkins, Ham, Guelfi and whoever we pick this year. Maybe Waterman depending on how he develops.

So we're already likely to start with at least one likely youngster in the seconds (two if we use pick #11 on a mid). We'd need 3 injuries before we're getting down to average guys like Guelfi, and even then we could play 3 set guys, 3 of Cox/Durham/Perkins, + Ham and #11, and still field a full midfield.

Now, if we were trying to win it next year, would I want another mature guy ahead of some of those kids? Yes. But it should be another development year, getting games into young kids. In which case Greenwood would be getting in the way, and would be a list clogger.

Oh, and if things were really dire, it would be Heppell I'd move back in there. You know, that AA midfielder we do have available....
 

Ants

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Agreed. Who is Hewett pushing out of that midfield. He can't really play elsewhere. If we are going to relegate McGrath to a half back or Stringer permanent forward, it better be a Oliver/Petracca level player forcing them out.
Exactly.
I wouldn’t have minded the depth.

There is an often overlooked factor in list age demographic conversations. It’s not just about whether the guy you get in can be useful for a period. I totally agree that Greenwood would have been useful on the 2022/23 list, and the salary doesn’t matter…. but he probably has no future beyond that.

The only thing he does cost is the possible upside on the kid you would have taken in his place. I understand why a side in our position would rather go a bit skinny for depth right now in the hope that they instead pick a kid who develops well and can impact a bit later when we have one leg in the window.
Why do you think they'd have come to be depth? And who in their right mind would spend $1.5m on Greenwood to be depth?

The thing he does cost is the game time that he takes from Perkins or pick #11. Right now we should be focussing on accelerating our kids development as much as possible while the talls come on. We can do that since we have a core of mature midfielders, so its very unlikely anyone will be first rotation without 4-6 critical injuries. So we play the core of mature midfielders, and get games into the youngsters on the fringe as much as possible. So we can be ready to challenge around 2024 or maybe even 2023 (by challenge I mean push for top 4).
 

JayJ20

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You’re making sense but it’s line ball whether that “contested brand” would have been swayed much by Greenwood running around in the 2s for half the year. Like… it wouldn’t hurt and might help. But we might also unearth a gun with a third round pick.

List management will be expecting all of Shiel, Caldwell, Stringer & Parish to be winning contested footy week in, week out. Hope they stay healthy!
See I don't expect he would have ran around in the 2s for half the year though. Given our injury history, he'd probably play every week he is available to play. Me saying he is "inside depth" is a little misleading because if I'm honest, he'd be better around stoppages than everyone except Parish. He'd also immediately become our best tackler. But I guess that's just my unpopular opinion.
Rutten also said in an interview that he expects the improvement in contested footy to come from the existing list.
I know he said that, but I don't expect that to happen with our current list. The only way I see it happening is if Stringer increases his midfield time or Caldwell suddenly plays 22 games with Parish-like improvement or if Perkins has a breakout year in the midfield. All 3 scenarios are unlikely.

But as you say, the midfield was hit hard by injuries, but still went well enough for us to finish top 8. Simply getting guys back from injury, and more time into Caldwell/Cox/Durham/Perkins and whoever we select this year will bring natural improvement.


At the moment if we play 8 midfielders, we've already got 6 of them locked in. Parish, Merrett, McGrath, Shiel, Langford, Caldwell. So that's ignoring Stringer. That leaves 2 spots for development of Cox, Durham, Perkins, Ham, Guelfi and whoever we pick this year. Maybe Waterman depending on how he develops.

So we're already likely to start with at least one likely youngster in the seconds (two if we use pick #11 on a mid). We'd need 3 injuries before we're getting down to average guys like Guelfi, and even then we could play 3 set guys, 3 of Cox/Durham/Perkins, + Ham and #11, and still field a full midfield.

Now, if we were trying to win it next year, would I want another mature guy ahead of some of those kids? Yes. But it should be another development year, getting games into young kids. In which case Greenwood would be getting in the way, and would be a list clogger.

Oh, and if things were really dire, it would be Heppell I'd move back in there. You know, that AA midfielder we do have available....
We finished top 8 with a record of 11-11. We went 1-9 against the top 8 sides. We were smashed in contested possessions against most of the best teams. Context is important. We've had Shiel, McGrath and Langford in the midfield before. I still don't think they would have made much of a difference. In fact, Shiel and McGrath being injured allowed Parish and Stringer to increase their midfield minutes, which made the midfield more effective, more balanced and improved our performance. It's no coincidence that Parish broke out after Shiel was injured and Stringer broke out after McGrath was injured. It's probably the best our midfield looked in years, yet it was still fairly average. Shiel and McGrath are good players so I'm not criticising them at all, it's more that our midfield balance is off.

I don't want Perkins to play midfield next year. I want him to develop his ability to impact the scoreboard and stay in the game as a forward first before he moves into the midfield group. He'll likely develop into a mid/forward in the Petracca/Dangerfield mould so I want him to hone his skills there first.

Durham still has a long way to go to be a consistent feature of our AFL side. Ham has to compete for his spot and show that he is capable of retaining his spot first. Playing the kids just because isn't a good way of developing them. We can develop younger players at VFL level first, then bring them into the AFL system once they've proven they can play at that level.

Rutten is a new coach. Keeping players engaged requires results. If he says we're going to play a contested brand and the result doesn't back that up, then how can he keep the players and supporters on his side? There's a lot of talk like always at this time of year. Let's see what happens at the end of next year.
 
Apr 23, 2016
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See I don't expect he would have ran around in the 2s for half the year though. Given our injury history, he'd probably play every week he is available to play. Me saying he is "inside depth" is a little misleading because if I'm honest, he'd be better around stoppages than everyone except Parish. He'd also immediately become our best tackler. But I guess that's just my unpopular opinion.

I know he said that, but I don't expect that to happen with our current list. The only way I see it happening is if Stringer increases his midfield time or Caldwell suddenly plays 22 games with Parish-like improvement or if Perkins has a breakout year in the midfield. All 3 scenarios are unlikely.


We finished top 8 with a record of 11-11. We went 1-9 against the top 8 sides. We were smashed in contested possessions against most of the best teams. Context is important. We've had Shiel, McGrath and Langford in the midfield before. I still don't think they would have made much of a difference. In fact, Shiel and McGrath being injured allowed Parish and Stringer to increase their midfield minutes, which made the midfield more effective, more balanced and improved our performance. It's no coincidence that Parish broke out after Shiel was injured and Stringer broke out after McGrath was injured. It's probably the best our midfield looked in years, yet it was still fairly average. Shiel and McGrath are good players so I'm not criticising them at all, it's more that our midfield balance is off.

I don't want Perkins to play midfield next year. I want him to develop his ability to impact the scoreboard and stay in the game as a forward first before he moves into the midfield group. He'll likely develop into a mid/forward in the Petracca/Dangerfield mould so I want him to hone his skills there first.

Durham still has a long way to go to be a consistent feature of our AFL side. Ham has to compete for his spot and show that he is capable of retaining his spot first. Playing the kids just because isn't a good way of developing them. We can develop younger players at VFL level first, then bring them into the AFL system once they've proven they can play at that level.

Rutten is a new coach. Keeping players engaged requires results. If he says we're going to play a contested brand and the result doesn't back that up, then how can he keep the players and supporters on his side? There's a lot of talk like always at this time of year. Let's see what happens at the end of next year.

You realise the 'contested brand' of football also entails players outside the midfield right?
 
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